Kane says nothing for a moment, but it's like he's struggling to suppress a response rather than contemplating her suggestion. He opens his mouth to speak, then holds off again, looking at her as if to say she really doesn't understand.

'Tell me this, Heather,' he says, finally having collected himself. 'Where's the control group when people say faith got a person through something? How do we compare how that person would have got on in the same situation without without their faith?' their faith?'

'But if you're his best friend, the one who understands most what he's been through, shouldn't you of all people respect the decisions he's made, the conclusions he's reached? Even if you disagree with them, shouldn't you accept how important to him Con's beliefs are?'

Kane nods like this is something he knows is true, even something that bothers his conscience, but then fixes her with a look of unapologetic sincerity.

'If I believed he he believed them, I would.' believed them, I would.'

Heather feels her mouth open slightly but nothing emerges. She's about to gently admonish him again for the inherent arrogance in Kane's words, when she realises that they explain everything she's never quite understood about Blake.

'When we were debating tonight,' Kane continues, 'did you really hear what he said? He talks about "the G.o.d I have faith in", not "the G.o.d I believe in". Con has always had faith in the idea idea of faith. What he has is a meta-faith. Con isn't a priest because he believes. He's a priest because he wants to believe. Since Gail died, he's spent his entire adult life searching for something that will of faith. What he has is a meta-faith. Con isn't a priest because he believes. He's a priest because he wants to believe. Since Gail died, he's spent his entire adult life searching for something that will make make him believe. And he's yet to find it.' him believe. And he's yet to find it.'

VII November 12th 2002. Tullian remembers it more vividly than any other day of his life. It was, effectively, a second birthday: a day of being reborn, pa.s.sing into a new world. A day when belief became fact and faith became reality. But not in a happy way.

He stood in an antechamber, having been silently escorted there by an elderly curate so imbued with a solemnity of duty that it was possible to imagine him having performed his role for a thousand years. Then he waited, alone, for almost an hour, before hearing a single pair of footsteps descend the staircase into the vault. He knew merely from the lightness of their gait that they did not belong to the man he expected, Cardinal O'Hara. Instead, he found himself confronted by the slight, octogenarian but nonetheless daunting figure of Cardinal Carlo Parducci. Tullian was not ashamed to admit that he felt his pulse race, and briefly entertained the most paranoid fears that he had been lured down here for reasons better a.s.sociated with the far south of Italy.

The laity and the media had talked of Joseph Ratzinger as being 'the Vatican's Rottweiler', but those truly in the know understood that it was Parducci who had long been the most feared man in Rome, the unseen power behind two of the preceding three papacies (John Paul I being the exception, with Luciani's efforts to marginalise Parducci's influence leading to the most squalid of rumours).

'Cardinal Tullian, peace be with you,' he said.

'Peace be with you.'

'I hope you breakfasted well, for it was your last meal on this Earth as you used to know it.'

That Parducci was speaking English, despite Tullian's fluent Italian, played a large part in salving his fears about what might be about to happen in this hidden and unwitnessed place. Parducci was extending a generous courtesy, and his tone was one of regret.

Parducci produced a key and pulled open the wide pair of wooden doors that dominated the antechamber. They revealed only a further door, this time of grey steel, its lock taking the form of an electronic keypad.

'What is this place?' Tullian asked.

'To put it in the context of your home country, Cardinal, this place is the Church's equivalent of what you may have heard referred to as Area 51.'

Parducci opened the steel door and led him inside, into his rebirth.

The specimens were enclosed in gla.s.s cases to prevent decaying contamination from the air, and kept in darkness to preserve them also from light; the vault being lit by ultraviolet lamps on the extremely rare occasions when anyone was permitted to view it.

Parducci first showed him a skeleton, picked clean by the ravages of time but shocking enough in bearing a tail at one end of its spine, horns protruding from its skull at the other.

'This one came into the Church's possession in 1321, slain in the mountains of Bavaria. If you look closely, you can see the damage to its upper arm from a sword blow, though it was in fact killed by being run through. Little is known beyond that. It was sent here by Matthias, Bishop of Mainz, and its discovery precipitated a truly b.l.o.o.d.y period of witch-hunting throughout Germany.'

He then led him to a desiccated and partially mummified specimen, dried-out skin still stretched across its frame, a look of snarling violence still legible on its grimacing face.

'This one was entrusted to us by King James VI of Scotland - later James I of England - in 1590. Attempts were made to preserve it, but as you can see, the means available to our predecessors at the time were inadequate. This one was taken alive and observed personally by James, who eventually had it transported - under all secrecy - to the Vatican. James had seen the beast tortured but feared the consequences of killing it, in case this merely freed its soul to possess another.

'The experience had a dramatic effect upon him and consequently upon his country. Witchcraft had been a criminal offence in Scotland before 1590 but very little action had been taken in the name of the law. However, having seen this demon live and breathe, James became both obsessed and paranoid. Within a year, three hundred alleged witches were tried for plotting to kill him, accused of feats such as summoning a storm to drown him at sea and attempting to conjure his death by melting a wax effigy of him. In 1597, he wrote his treatise on "Daemonologie". Hundreds upon hundreds of people were executed as witches throughout his reign.'

Parducci's words barely registered as Tullian stared aghast at these revolting affronts and contemplated the hideousness of all that their existence implied - for the world and, indeed, for the cosmos.

'Your letter to Cardinal O'Hara suggested that the shadow realm could be but an atom's width away. Here lies proof that the border between it and our world has already been breached. Demons are not merely symbolic, Cardinal, not simple projections of our darkest thoughts and most fearful nightmares. They have been coming through into our world for centuries, most probably for millennia.'

VIII 'Caitlin,' Rosemary whispers, as loudly as she dares. There's been no sound or movement from Bernie or Maria for some time now, and she doesn't want to waken them, but she's sure Caitlin hasn't fallen asleep yet.

She'd been hoping she would be the first to flake out. There's no temptation when there's no option, and there's no option while there are other people sharing your room. Even in the dark, they're only feet away, sensing movement, hearing all sound. There's no option. No temptation. No temptation means not lying there saying decades of the Rosary, partly as a distraction and partly in prayer to Mary for strength. How many Hail Marys, how many decades of the Rosary, since it began? How many hours awake? How many failures? And afterwards, how many tears?

'Caitlin,' she tries again.

There's no response.

It's Friday night; no, Sat.u.r.day morning now, technically. Sat.u.r.day night into Sunday morning will mark her little anniversary. Six weeks clean. Six weeks since she last succ.u.mbed. It was getting more all the time, but she couldn't say it was getting easier. Some things required less and less effort the more you got used to them, but this was like holding your breath. The longer you held out, the harder it became.

She used to read about drug abusers and, despite the Church's message of compa.s.sion towards the afflicted - hate the sin but love the sinner - she couldn't help but feel they were weak and self-indulgent. That was before she found her own heroin. Closer to the mark, she used to think the same thing about h.o.m.os.e.xuals, who were 'called to chast.i.ty' according to the Church. 'This inclination const.i.tutes for most of them a trial,' the Catechism said. 'These persons are called to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.'

Why couldn't they just call on G.o.d's strength and simply restrain themselves? she used to wonder. Now she knows.

This desire, it feels like a curse. She who has been so faithful, so devout, in every way that has been in her power; she who has never missed ma.s.s, said her prayers every night since she was three, given up most of her free time to church activities: she has committed a mortal sin. Knowingly, wantonly and repeatedly committed a mortal sin.

'Both the Magisterium of the Church - in the course of a constant tradition - and the moral sense of the faithful have declared without hesitation that masturbation is an intrinsically and seriously disordered act.' So said Pope Paul VI in Persona Humana Persona Humana 1975. She had searched for any update on the Church's position, or even a more liberal-minded interpretation of the previous, but as recently as 2000, the Scottish Catholic Education Commission's consultation doc.u.ment 'Relationships and Moral Education' reiterated that it was 'a very serious disorder that cannot be morally justified', while Pope Benedict had called it 'a debas.e.m.e.nt of the human body'. 1975. She had searched for any update on the Church's position, or even a more liberal-minded interpretation of the previous, but as recently as 2000, the Scottish Catholic Education Commission's consultation doc.u.ment 'Relationships and Moral Education' reiterated that it was 'a very serious disorder that cannot be morally justified', while Pope Benedict had called it 'a debas.e.m.e.nt of the human body'.

She wishes she was still a child, wishes she was back in what that same doc.u.ment reminded her, longingly, was a 'period of tranquillity and serenity', undisturbed by 'unnecessary knowledge'. She barely talks to boys now. She sometimes tells herself that she finds them disgusting, with their crudeness and base obsessions, but she knows that she's merely deflecting the blame. What disgusts her about them is only what she sees reflected of herself: what they make her want; what they make her do do.

She has to make her sacrifice to the Lord's cross, and accept that she has a condition that, like h.o.m.os.e.xuality, must be seen as a call to chast.i.ty. Thus she has to limit her interactions, keep her dealings with boys as stilted and functionary as possible. She can't let them give her imagination anything to feed upon, because that's how it starts. A moment of flirtation, a lewd comment, a stolen look: the slightest thing can be the seed, the germ. That's how temptation works.

It is a relief to be here, to be on retreat. Perhaps G.o.d knew she needed respite. Three nights in a room with three other girls. Three nights with no option. She's been looking forward to it, knowing it will ease her over the six-week mark and beyond.

So why can't she sleep?

Because a retreat is not enough. Three nights' respite is not enough. She needs to talk to somebody, but there is n.o.body she can can talk to: not about this. She can't confess it either, can't tell a priest. Not Father Blake, certainly, and not Canon Daly either. He's known her since she was about five, spoken to her three times a week at choir practice and what have you. talk to: not about this. She can't confess it either, can't tell a priest. Not Father Blake, certainly, and not Canon Daly either. He's known her since she was about five, spoken to her three times a week at choir practice and what have you.

Bernie and Maria are not an option. Nor is she going to ask Caitlin: 'Hey, do you touch yourself?' But Caitlin does seem spiky on the subject of the Church these days, and Rosemary has a sudden interest in discovering why. She wants to hear a dissenting voice: not that of a person who was always ambivalent or even hostile to her faith, but a person who used to be as devout as she. If she could talk, just talk to someone who might have a different perspective, she's sure that would help.

But help how? Help because basically she wants someone to say what she's done - what she wants to do again - is all right? Who could tell her that, with any authority, when the Catechism is so clear on the matter, and has been for centuries? Isn't she like a drug addict wishing the authorities would just legalise heroin rather than dealing with her own problem?

It's not not all right. That's why she's suffering. It's not rocket science. Sin leads to suffering. She sinned, ergo she is suffering. all right. That's why she's suffering. It's not rocket science. Sin leads to suffering. She sinned, ergo she is suffering.

So why, when she is not not sinning, does it feel like she's suffering more? sinning, does it feel like she's suffering more?

'Caitlin,' she whispers a third time. 'Are you awake?'

Jesus, take a hint, Caitlin thinks. Yes I'm awake, but hasn't it occurred to you that, after three attempts, I'm either asleep and ought to be left alone, or pretending pretending to be asleep, and thus attempting to convey the same message all the more strongly? Yes, Rosemary. I'm awake, but no, Rosemary, I don't want to have an in-depth late-night conversation about the latest p.r.o.nouncement by Pope Benedict, the Novus Ordo, the Tridentine Rite or whatever other tragic s.h.i.t you are disturbing enough to even to be asleep, and thus attempting to convey the same message all the more strongly? Yes, Rosemary. I'm awake, but no, Rosemary, I don't want to have an in-depth late-night conversation about the latest p.r.o.nouncement by Pope Benedict, the Novus Ordo, the Tridentine Rite or whatever other tragic s.h.i.t you are disturbing enough to even know know about. about.

For heaven's sake, girl, someone needs to remind you that you're seventeen, and you don't get to do this twice. Do you think an 'ever-loving G.o.d' would want you spending your adolescence alternating between anger and misery as a bunch of joyless old men in silly outfits tell you what to disapprove of and what to feel guilty about? Yep, good thing all the big issues Jesus cared about, such as poverty, tyranny, inequality and oppression, had been eradicated: that left the Church free to concentrate on piddly little issues that they personally had hang-ups about, like h.o.m.os.e.xuality and birth control.

At this most difficult age, feeling awkward, misshapen, spotty, graceless, uncool and confused, all of it ultimately down to s.e.x, it transpired that the only guidance an all-powerful super-being from a higher plane could offer on that baffling subject was: 'Try not to think about it. Put it out of your head until you're married.'

Why, thank you, Father, thank you, your Eminence, thank you, your Holiness. Thank you, Lord. That really saves us from the maelstrom of post-p.u.b.escent female emotions. Caitlin could picture a cross instead of a Nike swoosh: 'Just don't don't do it.' And what with them all being guys, they would be a lot of help dealing with what she has been going through of late. But then, it wasn't just religion that was useless when it came to this kind of thing. Who do it.' And what with them all being guys, they would be a lot of help dealing with what she has been going through of late. But then, it wasn't just religion that was useless when it came to this kind of thing. Who do do you talk to about having this weird mix of fear and fascination with the male member? you talk to about having this weird mix of fear and fascination with the male member?

It's been haunting her for ages: stalking her fantasies, killing them stone dead. She's seventeen years old and in no hurry to have s.e.x; let's face it, she would be grateful enough for the chance to walk, never mind fly. But even her thoughts and daydreams (not to mention her last-thing-at-night dreams) in which she plays out soft-focus and strictly soft-core scenarios about meeting the right boy, are being increasingly derailed. She envisions kind words, solicitous acts, soft lips, tender arms, and even, sometimes, delicate hands in delicate places - then up it rears, the serpent from the depths, the inescapable reality that lies in the extrapolations of even the most idealised imaginings.

That thing's got to hurt. It's got to do damage, and not just some rite-of-pa.s.sage, largely symbolic damage in breaking the hymen. She's never been able to use tampons, and they're the size of c.o.c.ktail sausages. There is no way that is ever fitting. And yet . . .

She lies there some nights simply wondering what it must feel like; and not only what it feels like to the touch, but what it must feel like to be male, to have have that appendage. How can it be flesh and yet supposedly so rigid? Is it like muscle that's become calcified? Surely that can't be pleasant. And how can the softness of a kiss, the softness of an embrace, the tenderness of caressing, give way, give a willing place to this brutal, unyielding thing? that appendage. How can it be flesh and yet supposedly so rigid? Is it like muscle that's become calcified? Surely that can't be pleasant. And how can the softness of a kiss, the softness of an embrace, the tenderness of caressing, give way, give a willing place to this brutal, unyielding thing?

Maybe when it doesn't seem scary any more is when you know you're ready to do it. It's difficult to imagine ever feeling that way, but then right now it's hard enough to imagine just having a boyfriend. She got off with her cousin's next-door neighbour Carl last Christmas down in Southampton, and apart from officially 'going with' Radar in Primary Five, that's been the sum of her love life. In the movies, Christ, in b.l.o.o.d.y Hollyoaks Hollyoaks, they're always having parties or hanging out in places where they can meet each other. How is she meant to find the time or the opportunity here in reality: studying for all these exams every night, working all day Sat.u.r.day for a little cash she seldom even has the chance to spend?

Then, of course, there is Sunday, a valuable chunk of which is sacrificed every week still going to ma.s.s because she is too chicken to tell her mum and dad what she really believes (and in particular what she really, really doesn't).

Yeah, quite the rebel. Quite the fearless heretic. Maybe the reason she is so sore on poor Rosemary for her ongoing a.s.sumptions is because she is too cowardly to tell anyone the truth. It's difficult, though. She's not good at confrontations, and she doesn't want to hurt her parents' feelings or in any way let them down. On the other hand, it's increasingly starting to burn that she is written off as a shiny-haloed goody-two-shoes. Yes, she's quiet and polite and she works hard: it's who she is, but it's not all all she is. It especially p.i.s.ses her off that people think because she's well behaved that she must also be dutifully religious. However, that doesn't p.i.s.s her off as much as the fact that, in the Church's sin-seeking and ever disapproving eyes, she is far better behaved than she'd sincerely like to be. she is. It especially p.i.s.ses her off that people think because she's well behaved that she must also be dutifully religious. However, that doesn't p.i.s.s her off as much as the fact that, in the Church's sin-seeking and ever disapproving eyes, she is far better behaved than she'd sincerely like to be.

Deborah actually finds it a relief when Miss Ross comes by and tells everyone it's time to go back to their own rooms. The vibe is still weird, uncomfortable, nothing like she imagined it would be. There's not even been much drinking: everybody's tired after the journey, and the consensus seems to be that they should save themselves - and the stash - for tomorrow night, when that Sergeant Sendak guy said they could set up a disco.

Julie's really been getting on her t.i.ts. She just won't let up about Deborah sharing a room with Marianne. It has obviously been some kind of personal triumph for the chubby cow, and she's seriously kicking the a.r.s.e out of it. It's all lesbian this and m.u.f.f-dive that. G.o.d's sake: get some new patter, ya fat ride.

It's not just Julie, though. Everybody's happy to join in, even Gillian, and though they're all acting like it's Marianne they're taking the p.i.s.s out of, Deborah can't pretend they don't think the joke is on her too.

She makes her way back to the two-bedded room, where she is greeted by the sight of Marianne dressed only in two towels, one tucked around her torso and a second wrapping her hair. There are wet footprints on the floor tiles. She's just out of the shower, having opted to grab one late at night when they're bound to be quiet. Smart move, Deborah thinks. It will be mobbed in the morning, unless she gets up before everyone else. Maybe she should set her phone alarm accordingly - she'll be wanting out of this room as early as possible anyway.

She's hopeful that the vibe will be different in the morning. They're going out on some kind of hike, so not only will there be none of this 'we're in, you're out' carry-on, but Julie is likely to be struggling to keep up. Plus, a night of listening to the tubby boot's desperate patter while she's trying to get to sleep would remind Gillian why it's Debs she usually hangs out with.

She should set the alarm for seven: half an hour earlier than Miss Ross told them they'd need to get up. She knows there's a fair chance she'll prize thirty more minutes in bed over feeling fresh when it actually comes to it (especially if they're going to be tramping about getting sweaty and mocket), but she'd like to have the option.

Deborah gets out her phone and hits the unlock code, intending to set the alarm, but finds it still on camera mode from the pics she took in the other room. On the tiny screen, she can see Marianne drying her hair, the topmost towel obscuring her face - and her line of sight - as she rubs vigorously at her straggly Goth mane. The lower towel is on the move too, the motion of her arms working it gradually free.

Deborah feels this sudden thrill, a sense of opportunity, and instinctively presses the Shoot b.u.t.ton as the towel drops, revealing Marianne's skinny t.i.ts and modest wee bush. She only gets a glimpse, but she estimates that she's naturally light on the thatch rather than manually kept in trim, and that Julie was probably lying about having seen her naked at the baths. Marianne reaches a hand blindly downwards, trying to retrieve the towel, then, not finding it, resumes drying her hair for a few seconds before bending to secure it again.

Feeling her pulse race and her head spin a little, Deborah stares fixedly at her phone and pretends to text, making out she wasn't looking. The picture is a good one: well lit and not blurry, with the goods all clearly on display. She feels something flush through her, fears her cheeks are glowing and may give her away. What if Marianne glimpses the phone? she wonders. She goes to save the photo so she can clear it from the screen, pressing the corresponding b.u.t.ton with her thumb. At the top of the resultant menu, above Save and Delete, is the option 'Send to'.

She thinks immediately of Gillian. A picture of any cla.s.smate in the scud would be social dynamite, but given that it's the creepy Goth weirdo, n.o.body would value this more. Oh the things they could do with it: pa.s.s it round, get it on Bebo. And the best part is, not only would Marianne be the last to know of its existence, but she couldn't even prove it was her, as her head was obscured.

Aye, she's totally got to send this to Gills. There's close to no signal round here, but maybe just enough for texting. Aye. A wee gift, flying from room to room over the airwaves: something secret just between them. It would get Gillian texting too: establish a special wee line of communication tonight so that they wouldn't be so separate. And wouldn't that put Julie in her place: Gills quietly texting Deborah in the dark instead of paying attention to all her rambling s.h.i.te.

She selects 'Choose recipient(s)', being very careful to select Gillian and only Gillian, but hesitates when it comes to pressing Send, a sudden onset of anxiety staying her hand. It's that sudden, vertiginous sense that there's no going back: she's doing something she won't be able to undo. A single tiny action of her thumb, setting a zero to a one inside the mobile, will commence a sequence of events that would be further and further out of her control.

She can see Gillian immediately sharing it with the others: no secret stifled giggles and quiet wee texts, but instead cackling it up with Yvonne, Theresa and Julie, the source all but forgotten. No, the source would not be forgotten: quite the opposite. Jesus. She suddenly envisions the hidden implications of what she'd be bringing down upon herself. Taking secret pics of another girl in the buff: it's actually Debs who's the lesbian. Even if they didn't believe that, even if they knew why she had really done it, it was in their power to pretend otherwise. She'd done it herself often enough: wilful misunderstanding, watching your victim squirm as her truthful and reasonable explanation is rendered irrelevant. This means what we want it to mean: that was the rule.

She cancels out of the Send menu but finds the file has autosaved. That's okay, she can delete it manually later. The main thing is she has stepped back from the brink of catastrophe. She puts down the phone like she's putting down a loaded gun. Relief runs through her, but it's not total: there's a new anxiety creeping in; or rather, a new perspective upon an established occasional worry.

Why had had she really done it, she asks herself? That thrill had come over her before she even understood why, and she had acted upon it instantly, way before it occurred to her what she might do with the resulting photograph. she really done it, she asks herself? That thrill had come over her before she even understood why, and she had acted upon it instantly, way before it occurred to her what she might do with the resulting photograph.

A familiar debate gets rehashed in her head. She's never done thinking about s.e.x, speculating about s.e.x: strictly heteros.e.xual, boy-on-girl s.e.x. However, it occurred to her recently that those speculations have never been about guys, only other girls: how far they've gone, what they have and haven't done, even whether they stylise their p.u.b.es, for f.u.c.k's sake. And now she's sneaking pictures of Marianne's nude torso. Does this mean . . . ? But if it did, wouldn't she feel differently about her friends? Surely she'd be aware she wanted to feel physically closer to them; surely she'd have caught herself thinking she wanted to kiss one of them? She could not remember ever imagining kissing a girl, and the thought right now makes her go icky. And yet, there she was a minute ago, wishing for a kind of intimacy with Gillian, a secret bond, and feeling all vulnerable and excluded because she's ended up in the wrong room.

Marianne climbs into her cosiest pair of long-sleeved and long trousered pyjamas, then blows her hair dry so she won't look too much like Helena Bonham Carter when morning comes around. She hasn't traded a word with Deborah, though her room-mate has at least progressed from demonstrably ignoring her to genuinely seeming rather withdrawn and pensive, the latter an extremely uncharacteristic condition for someone who didn't even have hidden shallows. She'd sat there rapt with her phone, like it was the Oracle at Delphi, then come over all ashen-faced like said Oracle had revealed to her the emptiness of her soul - by text.

After dinner, Marianne had sat alone, reading, while everyone else scuttled in and out of each other's rooms and pretended to themselves that they were in some lame teen movie. Too bad it wasn't Scream Scream. Nah, she didn't mean that. Not entirely. Thirty per cent, at most. Maybe forty.

Roisin had asked - politely and charitably - if she wanted to come next door where they were playing cards, but she declined, preferring to spend a little time on cards of her own. She didn't want anybody being 'nice' to her. Sure, it was a little sulky and m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.tic, but in self-harm terms, it put her at the way-healthy end of the emo scale.

This is her fourth secondary school, due to her mum's job moving the two of them around. She has to go where the contracts are, keep the money flowing in. Her dad pays child support, but in her mum's eyes, that has to be supplementary - she never wants to be in a situation where she is relying on anything from him.

That is another reason why her mum keeps upping sticks and completely relocating. Her dad was - is - an alcoholic; a recovering one, these days, but in the past an occasionally violent one. It wasn't extreme; didn't have to be. He hit her mum twice, or twice that Marianne is aware of; on both occasions just lashing out, as opposed to sustained attacks. Her mum said she'd only forgive him once, and she was as good as her word. He hasn't fallen off the wagon since the divorce and is ent.i.tled to stay in touch with Marianne, but Mum doesn't want to make that easy for him. A change of address every year or so seems to be part of the strategy.

It's always Catholic schools she gets enrolled in, even though her mum doesn't go to ma.s.s or send Marianne there either. She can't remember her mum ever going, in fact, though she knows she used to. She got Marianne baptised, but by Mum's admission, that was largely to placate her grandparents. Yet every time they moved, she insisted on a Catholic school. It was some kind of tribalism, a running to what she knew because it offered a form of security amidst the unfamiliar. When you keep having to relocate to new places, you need the rea.s.surance of certain things being consistent, even if they are consistently c.r.a.p. That was why McDonald's was so successful. People didn't really like McDonald's, same as her mum didn't really like Catholicism, but when you were new in town, at least it was a known quant.i.ty. So that'll be a Quarter-Pounder and a Communion Wafer meal-deal to go.

But after four schools in five years, she's long since done with making an effort to be liked. Thus, she'd rather be alone than be tolerated, and she'd rather be creepy and unnerving than popular.

Her hair dried and tied back for the night, she settles down at the head of her bed, cross-legged above the covers. Having carefully arranged a couple of books on the occult where Deborah is likely to notice them, she then gets out her tarot pack and begins sifting out the major arcana from the deck. She has dealt ten of them into a Hagall spread on the bedcovers and is poring over them when her room-mate returns from brushing her teeth and performing her ablutions.

'What are you doing?' Deborah asks with a combination of scorn and anxiety.

'Tarot.'

'Oh no, cool the jets. You're not trying to summon up spirits. That stuff pure freaks me out. My cousin did that once: had a seance, and all sorts of weird stuff started happening. I was terrified. The house has had a weird atmosphere ever since. My auntie ended up asking Canon Daly about it. He said it was very dangerous stuff and you shouldn't be meddling in it. It's a sin, in fact.'

'I don't think a bunch of girls getting hysterical at a sleepover const.i.tutes dabbling in the occult.'

'You weren't there. Maureen contacted the spirit of Kurt Cobain, and-'

Marianne tries to maintain a straight face so that Deborah will keep going, but she can't hold back from laughing.'

'Kurt Cobain? Are you serious?'

'Aye,' Deborah insists. 'It was the anniversary of his death . . . what's so f.u.c.king funny?'

'I'm just trying to picture Cobain in the afterlife. He's jamming with Jimmy Hendrix and Freddie Mercury, John Bonham's on drums, but he blows them all off because he'd rather go communicate with some daft teenagers in Gleniston.'

Deborah looks slightly crestfallen and a little confused.

'I thought you were into all that stuff.'

'Oh, I'm "into it" all right, a lot more seriously than your cousin. Which is why I know what I'm doing. It's not about summoning up dead pop stars.'

'So what is it about?' Deborah asks.